different between tantalize vs taxonomy

English

Etymology

From Tantalus (????????) in Greek mythology, who was condemned to Tartarus in the underworld. There, he had to stand for eternity in water that receded from him when he stooped to drink, beneath fruit trees whose branches were always out of reach.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?tænt?la?z/

Verb

tantalize (third-person singular simple present tantalizes, present participle tantalizing, simple past and past participle tantalized)

1. (transitive) to tease (someone) by offering something desirable but keeping it out of reach
2. (transitive) to bait (someone) by showing something desirable but leaving them unsatisfied

Quotations

• 1880 — John Boyle O'Reilly, Moondyne

  They could not bear to be tantalized nor tortured by the splendid delusion.

• 1884 — Edwin Abbott Abbott, Flatland, section 22

  All pleasures palled upon me; all sights tantalized and tempted me to outspoken treason, because I could not but compare what I saw in Two Dimensions with what it really was if seen in Three, and could hardly refrain from making my comparisons aloud.

• “It was—simply amazing,” she repeated abstractedly. “But I swore I wouldn’t tell it and here I am tantalizing you.”

• 1936 — H. P. Lovecraft, At the Mountains of Madness, Ch. IX

  As we threaded our dim way through the labyrinth with the aid of map and compass ... we were repeatedly tantalized by the sculptured walls along our route. ... If we had had more films, we would certainly have paused briefly to photograph certain bas-reliefs, but time-consuming hand-copying was clearly out of the question.

Related terms

• tantalizing

Translations

English

Etymology

Borrowed from French taxonomie. Surface analysis taxo- +? -nomy.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /tæk?s?n?mi/
• (US) IPA^(key): /tæk?s??n?mi/
• Rhymes: -?n?mi

Noun

taxonomy (countable and uncountable, plural taxonomies)

1. The science or the technique used to make a classification.
2. A classification; especially, a classification in a hierarchical system.
3. (taxonomy, uncountable) The science of finding, describing, classifying and naming organisms.

Synonyms

• taxonomics
• (science of finding, describing, classifying and naming organisms): alpha taxonomy

Coordinate terms

• nomenclature
• ontology

Derived terms

Translations